


Accounts and More Of Them

by ivy



Category: Wallflower Series - Lisa Kleypas
Genre: F/M, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-20
Updated: 2012-12-20
Packaged: 2017-11-21 16:45:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,145
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/599932
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ivy/pseuds/ivy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Busy as a devil in a high wind didn't <em>begin</em> to cover it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Magicienne](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Magicienne/gifts).



When he woke up it was still dim outside.

Well, that hadn't happened to him in awhile. He glanced over at Evie: she was still asleep. That meant that if he had remembered—

He had. The vase of roses was exactly where he had left it last night, and he padded back into the room. Then he picked the petals of the roses off, scattering them lightly over the counterpane, dividing his attention between the flower and Evie. Evie was winning. He touched the skin of her face, feeling foolish but unable to stop himself. Finally, when he had gone through the handful of flowers - and left one on her cheek - he gave in and went downstairs to see what the club needed. But - sentiment again - he bent and kissed the smattering of freckles over her nose.

From the balcony, all looked well. This early in the morning, the room was almost deserted; the muted roar of men making and losing fortunes would come later. He would have to see later if the croupiers were doing their duties - or indeed were there, because Egan's laxity had affected the men underneath him, and Sebastian had found it necessary to replace a few from their posts already. The shooting hadn't helped any.

Cam grinned at him when Sebastian pushed open the study door, but there was no malice in it, playful or not, Sebastian conceded.

"Didn't think to see you this early," Cam said, and Sebastian rolled his eyes. If Evie were here she would have flushed scarlet, but then that was the difference between them.

"I thought that you'd be out on the floor," Sebastian returned, and shut the door.

Cam's expression cleared in an instant, turning immediately to a more serious cast. "I can't," he said, giving the heavy ledger in front of him an exasperated push.

Sebastian sank into the chair opposite and turned the ledger around to read the contents. The scrawl of dark ink was a mess, and it was a good minute before he realized what it was. "You're going through the kitchen accounts now?" he asked in surprise.

"After Mr Jenner got too sick, Egan managed everything."

"The household accounts too," muttered Sebastian, and ran his finger down the rows to be sure of what he was seeing. Though Egan had fudged many of the orders for the club, these seemed normal - if the enormous quantities were to be believed. Had the club really ordered so many potatoes? 

"How much food does the club need to serve? Do you have figures for the attendance?" Sebastian's mind ran on as Cam got up and plucked another volume off the shelf, opening it with a crack on the table. He looked tired, actually; he had probably been up all night, and came here in the morning to fix the ledgers. Sebastian felt an unwelcome twinge of guilt.

Cam scratched at the papers silently, and Sebastian brought his mind to the figures on the paper with effort. The club had run sufficiently well during Jenner's illness, that was true, but not that well; Sebastian checked the membership list with the date food came in, and sat back with a sigh. His mind wandered, and more often than not he had to drag it down from where it lingered over Evie. 

"You could talk to the cook," said Cam, not looking up. He had a scrap of paper laid over the books, upon which he was scribbling arithmetic; Sebastian heartily abhorred menial calculations, but he suspected he'd be doing them anyway. This was what happened when you were corrupted by your wife.

"What?"

"Talk to the cook. See if the numbers match up." Cam did look up then, giving him a white-gleam of a smile. "Unless you know how much food a hundred men consume in a night when they're gaming?"

Sebastian gave him a glare. Not the full one, because after last night he hardly thought he could muster any serious anger, but it was sufficient. Cam ducked his head and scratched a few more figures, though the smile didn't go away. 

He pushed away from the table with bad grace to talk to the cook. He passed several maids going about their cleaning and, with some amusement, one of the patrons who had stayed over the night. The man looked a mess, his waistcoat gone and his wig lost. Sebastian steered him carefully in the direction of the club's entrance, letting him lean on Sebastian's arm since it looked as though he mightn't make it down the carpeted stairs otherwise. 

When he returned to the study it was with a head full of concepts he'd never wished to learn before, and was now obliged to learn. 

"So?"

"The cook says they've been short flour for weeks and have been avoiding serving meat as much as possible," said Sebastian, dropping into the chair. He flipped through the last month's expenses again critically. Egan had taken advantage subtly; Sebastian suspected that someone like Cam or the maids who went out to buy things would have known better than he what was overpriced, but even to his untrained eye it seemed likely. That meant another trip to speak with the staff, and internally he groaned. It made him feel like an idiot, but the duke had never needed to know these things, and hadn't taught them to Sebastian either. He'd always been better at managing people than figures. 

"And Rohan," he said, "who are we missing?" He turned the page, circling the amounts he thought might have been falsified. He'd go after Egan if he thought it would be worth the trouble, but it would probably cost more to fight him. The club would have to sustain the losses. "Do we have enough men to cover the night shifts at the tables?"

"No," said Cam immediately. 

"Where?"

"There's never been a great number of men to watch the tables in the first place, and two of them left after Egan did," said Cam straight away, "And Mrs Smith, who runs—"

"Runs roughshod over the maids, yes."

"—runs the household was looking for more help but couldn't fit it in with the money she had," Cam said, unfazed. "And she wanted to know what to do with the rooms after the whores were cleared out of the upper chambers; there's a lot of space now."

"Use them for patron's quarters," said Sebastian. That was why he had removed them, after all, and struck the bargain with Madame Bradshaw. Well, that, and the memories of the club's drafty stable. He rubbed his temples. It wasn't even noon, and there were already two major problems he needed to solve. "I escorted out one totally unsteady man, and it'd be cruelty to set them out in the cold in that state."

"Fine," said Cam.

It wasn't that he was particularly contemptuous of that man: that had been Sebastian only a few months ago. What had offended him was the inelegance, men who had no ability to hold their liquor at all. And as for patron's quarters - Sebastian could imagine what it would do to the club's reputation if he started shoving patrons out at first light, and Sebastian had ideas for the improvements. The club would have to recoup some of the losses it had suffered from Jenner's mismanagement of money and his illness both - though the shooting would certainly add some piquancy. If it such an event had happened a year ago, he'd have been intrigued, at least, at a club like Jenner's trying to resurrect itself.

"Do we have a list of members anywhere?" asked Sebastian.

"On the shelf in the red book."

It was better kept than the accounts, at least. Someone had taken time and noted down addresses and how much each member owed, and next to some of the patrons were little notes about their behaviour in a precise hand; Sebastian glanced up, but Cam was scratching away in his own book. He could work with this, because the ton would be eager to see how he would measure up. Some improvement in the club itself - he'd talked to the cook with an eye toward some different dishes already - would help, too, once he got the men inside the doors of the club. 

*

He was discussing the possibility of investments into a shopping bazaar - how had he come to this point? - when he felt the back of his neck prickle; he turned around and saw Evie and felt his thoughts fall out of his mind. 

Whatever this was seemed to have moved past Evie's appearance, because as delectable as she looked (very), it couldn't account entirely for the sudden quickening of his breath, the fact that the accounts and the matter he had been discussing had become irrelevant. And she hadn't said anything yet.

He said something garbled to her, bent his attention forcibly back to the shopping bazaar; there was something not quite right about the offer. Not fraudulent, but if he agreed he'd be stuck, and at this point the club probably couldn't take any more strain. At Westcliff's interruption, he felt a jolt of vindication, and an almost painful sensation of gladness that Westcliff hadn't cut him off entirely. He tucked Evie's arm into his, towing Westcliff with them to the breakfast table and left Cam to the accounts. He'd manage them later. For now, having his friend and his wife outstripped aught else.


	2. Chapter 2

"Rawthorne!" Sebastian called. One of his friends, from the time _before_. Sebastian ran through what he could remember of Rawthorne - that awful journey to Scotland seemed to split this life; here was him now, and that was him from before. Rawthorne was a good friend to go drinking with, he remembered. Always willing to go to the next club over, to jump into any adventures his friends proposed, amiable when drinking and whoring, and unlike many of Sebastian's other companions, actually moneyed enough to do it. 

An excellent man to start with.

He walked through the crowd to catch up with Rawthorne, slapping him on the back as soon as he got within reaching distance.

"Rawthorne!" He caught him staring, and followed his gaze around. The upper balconies were beginning to fill with onlookers, too, and the floor was pressing with bodies. They had fixed and repainted the tall columns and walls, reupholstered furniture, and had set more lights. It probably looked different. The volume was the same though. Sebastian had to shout. "What brings you?"

"When they told me you'd taken over Jenner's, I thought they were joking!" shouted Rawthorne in lieu of reply. "Laughed at Lynde, but St Vincent, what have you done?"

"Turned my hand to grubbing," said Sebastian, and steered Rawthorne towards one of the hazard tables. Rawthorne's particular weakness was not hazard, but there were too many men crowded around the other tables. This would have to do. "Here, I'll get you a place," and signalled to the boy sitting at the table to include Rawthorne. He turned, seeing more of his former friends: Edwards looking positively ecstatic at the crush of people, Johnson was already seated at what appeared to be the highest-staked game of loo, Williams on the sidelines watching and eating what appeared to be a mince pie. A few of them acknowledged Sebastian as he looked around, but most of them were already deep in play; he could talk to them later. For now he had to deal with the increasing rush of people. His advertising - and the conversation with the police - had been successful, and now he only had to make sure that the club was as exclusive as it could be. 

He made a slow circuit of the game rooms, watching to see which of the managers were quick and deft and which were still unable to deal with the rush of men clamouring for everything. Most of them were Jenner's old employees, and seasoned not only to the game-play but also to Jenner's temper; the old man's training would have stood all of them in good stead.

A few of his acquaintances bumped into him - deliberately, he thought - and tried, like Rawthorne, to see what he was doing, and out of them a few of them were contemptuous - Julien, in particular. But Julien was playing hazard now in the table in the left quadrant of the room and looking increasingly sour; that would mean he was losing, then. Sebastian remembered the time they had all been at Jenner's - this room, really - and had watched Julien lose several hundred pounds. Same pinched look. But Sebastian was finding he was enjoying it, despite the scorn: running the club, watching as the patrons streamed in and out, all of it. He'd been a gamer himself for a long time, but it was more interesting on this side. Halfway around the circuit, he met Rohan, who had apparently gotten up to do the same thing.

"I don't think we've had so many in a long time," said Rohan. He was shouting, too. "Talk to you about restricting membership." 

Sebastian nodded and went upstairs. The upper balconies were quieter than the main floor; in previous years, they would have been where the men could find a partner or simply watch the tumult at the tables. Now, they were occupied by small pockets of men standing about, discussing matters in low voices. Some more chairs wouldn't go amiss on this floor.

He went downstairs again, poking his head as unobtrusively as he could into the smaller rooms. Unlike the main room, where the spectators were boisterous, the men at the tables here were quiet and intense. The boy dealing was quick-eyed; he saw Sebastian the minute he entered and returned his attention immediately to the players. Good. He moved to the next room. And then one of the patrons tried to grab him - Sebastian felt the reek of alcohol hit his nose even before the man touched him - and demanded to know what Sebastian's business was; he detached the man's fingers from his arm as quickly as he could, and tried to push him in the direction of the door. Breaking up one drunken brawl a night was quite enough for him, thank you. 

He succeeded in hailing a cab for the man and paid the hackney driver, reckoning it was better to send the man off than to fuss with extracting payment from him. Back in the main room, he glanced around once, just in case something had gone wrong in his absence, and saw that Evie was standing upstairs, watching the activity.

Sebastian's heart almost choked him as he hurried up the staircase. Before talking, though, he tried to moderate his tone. Evie had never struck him as reckless, but she did make terrifying decisions sometimes. Like their marriage, though Sebastian pretended not to notice that one. It was easier for his peace of mind. 

It still came out as, "What are you doing here?" The upper balcony was almost deserted; the little huddle of men who had been upstairs had disappeared, leaving behind a newspaper but nothing else. 

"Looking at the activity," said Evie, tipping her head towards the balcony rail. The light gleamed off her bound hair.

Sebastian grunted. That was true, but mostly he wanted to tell her not to come, that it might be dangerous to lurk about the club when so many inebriated patrons were gaming. He stared out over the railing, too, moving close enough to grip her wrist.

"It really is filling up, isn't it?" said Evie eventually, once they had watched - and listened - to the clamour of below for a minute or so. Nothing had demanded his attention yet; the cries of those losing had not gone beyond frustration. "You'll have to do something about the overload, I suppose. And the mess," she added, as one of the servers was knocked off balance by someone rushing by. From this vantage point, Sebastian had no idea who the clumsy one was and no way of telling. Pity.

"It is," said Sebastian. He had progressed from holding her wrist to rubbing his thumb over it, and she had just leaned into him. Absently he said, "Jenner didn't restrict members much, but if it's done the club will run better."

"Mmm," she said. They watched one man, his archaic full-bottom wig slipping, as he got up to lambast the fellow across the table, dropping his cards before him. Since it wasn't he who had to calm feathers this time, Sebastian watched in amusement. Cam was making an unobtrusive approach towards the pair, stepping around the men on the floor, but the surrounding crowd didn't like the fighting much either, and one of them grabbed the sloppy wig and steered him away. 

"You're doing a good job, though," she said softly, catching him by surprise. He always fell into these traps, letting down his guard at the worst moments. First the gunshot wound - no, first the marriage, in fact, and now this - he was doomed now. He refused to admit how much the approval of Evie mattered. It was her father's club, for sure, but her opinion shouldn't matter nearly as much as it did. He seized on the topic of the club - always an effective diversion for conversation - and said, to bring it back round: "Did you look at the correspondence today?"

Something unidentifiable flashed across her expression, but she answered readily enough. "More offers for business expansion, some from what I think are your acquaintances, and advertisements." She frowned. "But I put them on your desk - haven't you been there to see them?"

He had been very busy. After the breakfast with Westcliff and Evie, he had been waylaid by one of the housemaids with problems about the menu, whereupon he had become even more dismayed by the state of the household accounts, went to find someone to help with the tables, had to break up another fight - this time, at least, it was not a test and he was assisted most vigorously by Dawes - and went back to trying to make sense of the ledgers. He was leaning too heavily on Rohan for this, perhaps, but there weren't precisely many men he could ask, and his relationship with Westcliff was a little too sore to be stretched right now. 

"No," he said, and gave her a melodramatic recitation of everything that had happened. She winced when he mentioned the fight, and the cracking of dishes that had gone along with it, but squeezed his arm. Down in the game room came a roar as someone rolled, and the sound attracted more spectators. Not him on duty tonight, he reminded himself. 

"You've done a wonderful job," she said again, and rubbed her eyes. "Bed?" she asked, and he let her tug him upstairs.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to [blithers](http://archiveofourown.org/users/blithers) and [mikeneko](http://archiveofourown.org/users/mikeneko) for all their help! Any mistakes remaining are my own.


End file.
